


crushcrushcrush

by polyracha



Category: Stray Kids (Band)
Genre: But mostly angst, Feelings Realization, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Non-Idol AU, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-25
Packaged: 2020-05-19 06:35:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19351459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polyracha/pseuds/polyracha
Summary: Maybe it’s not love but it still hurts like it.





	crushcrushcrush

It’s not that cliche, Seungmin thinks. Or at least it could be more cliche. Hyunjin wasn’t his childhood best friend, or a first-sight love, or his other half or anything like that. He’s a relatively new addition to their mildly unkempt culdesac, having moved in over the summer just before school started. They’re in the same grade and walk the same way, that’s how Seungmin knows him. And Hyunjin is way more social, that’s how they wind up talking for the first time.

“Is that Paramore?” He can still clearly recall Hyunjin saying to him, his headphones having blared his music just slightly too loud. “I love them, that’s my favorite song too. Do you listen to Flyleaf?”

It kickstarts their friendship, a bond consisting of sharing music taste, having shitty home lives, and Seungmin being jealous of all the wacky colors Hyunjin dyes his hair. It doesn’t help that, though the actual age difference is small, Hyunjin just sort of has this air of “older” that Seungmin can’t properly describe. It’s like he’s more world-weary in a way that makes Seungmin both awed and slightly sad. It isn’t long until they’re hanging out more often, Hyunjin sometimes even crashing at his place and eating dinner there more often than at his own home. His sisters are annoying, he claims. Seungmin’s older sister is already in her 20s and way too cool to hang around a couple of teenage boys.

Hyunjin is objectively gorgeous, in as many ways as Seungmin is not. You would’ve had to have been blind not to see it and Seungmin was not blind. It was normal, he thought, to admire his friend. There was nothing wrong with thinking your best friend is the most gorgeous person you’ve ever seen in your entire life.

“What would you do if I was gay?” He’d blurted out one day, fighting down a vicious blush at his own lack of filter. Hyunjin had spared him just a brief glance and then shrugged noncommittally.

“I mean like I’m bi so what’s the big deal?” And that had been it. When Seungmin really thinks about it, he supposes he owes a lot of the calmness surrounding his early sexual exploration to Hyunjin. The easy way he’d handled it had always settled heavily in his mind. The only thing that had really caused any upset was when Hyunjin later admitted to him that he still hadn’t had his first kiss, “not even with a girl”. “I just don’t understand the hype,” he’d said, “it’s just touching mouths isn’t it?”

Truthfully Seungmin didn’t understand either, but for some reason the thought wouldn’t leave him alone. It was like a parasite, or a toxic gas, chewing through every thought and melting it down until it all came back to Hyunjin and kissing. By this point the two of them could reasonably be considered best friends. They hung out more often than not, they spilled all manner of secrets, they talked more than Seungmin had even thought you could talk in a day, and yet some odd magnetic force keeps drawing him into these thoughts of Hyunjin’s smile and Hyunjin’s hair and Hyunjin’s mouth. He was attractive and Seungmin had always been aware of that, but he thinks maybe it’s weird to be this attracted to his best friend.

It comes to a head one night when Hyunjin sneaks him out of the house so they can watch the sky from on top of his old tin shed. It’s hot, the thick air around them making their shirts stick to their skin. Even now, when he’s dripping with sweat and bleary-eyed with tiredness, Seungmin thinks he’s one of the most beautiful things he’s ever seen.

“We could try.” He blurts out, once again stupidly unable to keep his mouth shut. Hyunjin gives him an odd look, so he swallows his embarrassment and elaborates. “Kissing, I mean.”

He thinks that Hyunjin will say no. Reasonably Hyunjin should say no. He doesn’t. He looks thoughtful for a long moment and then hesitantly nods his head. “Okay,” he says, “sure.”

They both lean in slowly, meeting somewhere in the middle. Hyunjin’s lips are plush and soft, warmer than the air around them and slightly salty. It doesn’t last long, and Seungmin only realizes his eyes are closed when he pulls away. There’s a look on Hyunjin’s face, some kind of disappointed grimace, and Seungmin can feel the tingle in his lips and the pit in his stomach in equal intensity. A realization begins to set in that he should’ve had a long time ago.

“See, I don’t get it,” Hyunjin puzzles. “What’s all the fuss about?”

Seungmin swallows around something intangible that makes his throat feel ugly-tight and aching. “Maybe it’s different when it’s with someone you really like.”

Sensing the shift in the air, Hyunjin doesn’t respond and instead turns his eyes back skyward. His gaze stays firmly fixed on the moon while Seungmin stares down at his lap and tries to will some feeling back into his shaking hands. This is not a revelation he wanted to have tonight, in this way, but it’s suddenly too late.

Hyunjin helps him put the screen back in his window when he climbs back into his bedroom, bidding him a quiet goodnight and beginning the trek back to his own house just down the street. Without having to ask, he knows he won’t be staying over tonight.

Seungmin barely has the energy to shuck off his pants as he shuffles under his covers and pulls them tight around his shoulders. Rough finger pads glide over his lips, the tingle still present but fading. He’s stupid. Entirely stupid. Unequivocally, unquestionably, inarguably stupid because still the only thing he can think of is Hwang Hyunjin. Hyunjin’s eyes reflecting the light of the stars, Hyunjin’s hair sweat-matted but still so soft, Hyunjin’s lips. Hyunjin, Hyunjin, Hyunjin. His hand falls away from his lips as his body gives one bitter sob before seemingly realizing it isn’t worth the energy and leaving him to cry himself to sleep in silence.

His dreams are all about Hyunjin, too.


End file.
